Ark in the Storm
by lotuskasumi
Summary: 100 Theme Challenge, for Hope x Lightning fics of varying length. Told in no particular linear fashion whatsoever, but connected by the running theme of their relationship. To be updated whenever I get an inundation of emotions about these two. **Chap. 5: Just a bunch of 'person A is sick and requires comfort from person B' standard fluff fair. Purely self-indulgent. [Post-Series.]
1. Chapter 1

**#10 - Breathe Again**

Hope's workload was getting to be as such that the only time he felt he could breathe easier, was when he was falling face first into the inviting crush of pillows and sheets on his bed at home. Every moment before that was an endless stretch of having only enough air to keep himself from collapsing. It was at home where he felt he could be at peace.

There was also the incomparable benefit of Claire - not Lightning, not anymore - being just a few inches away each time he returned home at these ghastly hours. Hope couldn't deny _that_ was a significantly uplifting factor to the whole miserable process. The discomfort and awkward shuffle of their first few years together had passed - not quickly, and certainly not always with full confidence - long enough to see them through what they both hoped would be years of well-deserved comfort. Not exactly domestic _bliss_, no, that wasn't something either of them aimed for, or even told themselves that they wanted. There was too much shadow mixed in with their every peaceful, happy days, and too many ghosts haunting the edges of their memories. Bliss was out of their reach, but they could settle instead for the closest thing to happiness - as long it was a happiness they forged for themselves, together.

Hope wasn't sure there was a word for it. Maybe happiness was the safest, most sensible option to choose, though his life with Claire and his life because of Claire often exceeded the scope of such an overlooked word. Hope couldn't often think of how to describe the little things that living with Claire made him feel, but this didn't stop him from trying to do so to himself, to his friends, to his co-workers who glanced slyly at every lunch-time visit Claire made to his office. It was rather hard to explain the strange joy he felt at hearing her traipse through the rooms of their apartment, half asleep and fumbling back from the bathroom or into the kitchen for a late night snack. It was hard to explain, and harder to even consider, just why he should feel so happy whenever he looked up from a book and find her dozing on the couch, one foot dangling off the edge, one hand curled fast around the nearest pillow. There was a curious sort of glee to be felt, combined with the typical thrill of eavesdropping, at hearing Claire talk angrily to the roses in their window-sill "garden," or overhearing her laugh with her sister on the phone.

He had quite the list of little things to adore about his wife. The way she chewed on the corner of her mouth when she started the Sunday Crossword, the way she cracked her knuckles, one at a time, before moving on to pop her wrists in short, terse circles - how she sang along quietly with the radio, how she fit better into his shirts than he ever could, how she learned how to properly do up a tie just so she could show him how quickly she could take it off (and sometimes with her teeth)... All of these things were Claire, and all of them were things Hope adored. All these little details that made her into a person, no matter how curious or small, helped lift his heart out of its mire of constant stress.

And now they wanted to take that away, too. For a time.

"Think of it like a test," Claire said, sighing audibly on the other end of the line when he called one night to cancel dinner - again - and apologize - again and again - for having to stay late.

"It _is_ a test," Hope agreed, leaning his elbow on the desk, pinching the bridge of his nose, and closing his eyes. "It's a test of my patience."

Her sympathetic little laugh brought a faint smile to Hope's face. "No, I meant a test for your future standing in the lab," she said. "Didn't you say they were interested in making you head researcher?"

"I said I _thought_ they were," Hope corrected gently, "but I didn't expect to get this kind of treatment."

"They're working you harder because they know you can do it," Claire said. He could so easily picture her prompt little nod, coupled with the way her eyes would narrow and shine, taking on the force of her conviction. He always loved it when she looked like that. She made everything so much easier to believe. "It was like that all the time for me back - well, back then."

Hope noted her verbal stumble and picked up the little hint as gently as he could. "Back in the Corps, you mean."

"Yeah, that." Her voice had beocme noticeably clipped.

"I always admired that about you," Hope said, wanting to lighten the mood and her heart in the bargain. "I don't think I'd be here today if you didn't have that kind of drive."

"Don't be ridiculous," she said.

Hope didn't take the dismissal to heart. He knew her better than to take it as a serious offense. "I'm not ridiculous. I'm being honest."

"Well, don't be honest. Just be nice."

"O...kay?" Hope balanced the phone on his shoulder to hold it against his ear and reached out for the coffee cup on his left (cold, bland, and burned). He used his right hand to begrudgingly tug another pile of charts and notes closer, a familiar ache building up above his eyes like a crown of frustrating pain. "Are you all right, Claire?"

"Sorry," Claire said, laughing again. "There's a match on. It's distracting me."

That explained a few things. "Who's winning?" he asked, sincerely interested. Of all the newfound passions she had discovered, Claire's appreciation for professional wrestling remained the most bizarre of all, as well as the most endearing.

"Well I _thought_ it was gonna be El Generico," she said, delivering the name as seriously as one might give a eulogy, "but Captain Carnage just did a sick reversal into an armbar, so now I'm not sure."

Hope chuckled at this, and then laughed in full when he heard Claire shout, _"Tap! Tap already! TAP OR SNAP!"_ at the television, her voice at a distance. She'd either dropped the phone in excitement, or had the presence of mind to move the device away from her mouth before the yelling started.

"Sorry about that," she said after a few seconds passed, grumbling darkly once she returned to the line.

"So, did he tap?" Hope asked.

"No. Misha Boss ran in and caused a distraction. Now the ref's wasting time trying to get rid of her. What a mess," Claire sighed. "That was gonna be a good match, too. What shitty booking."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry; you didn't do anything."

"Well, I'm sorry to hear it. That's what I meant."

"Hope." How was it that the way she said his name - in all tones and in all ways - could still make his heart shudder, could still makes his brain snap to attention, as if he'd never heard his name being said before? After all this time, after so many years, every word she said was as fascinating as if he were hearing it for the first time. "You've already apologized enough today. You met your apology quota - and all for things out of your control, I might add. It's _fine_, trust me."

Hope wanted to thank her, but she broke off again and began to yell loudly at the results of the match. Hope caught words like_ "shitty finish"_ and "_terrible psychology"_, which didn't make much sense to him out of context, while loud, angry rock music blared out tunelessly from further behind Claire's voice.

If he were there in person, Hope might take this chance to cup her face in his hands and give her a quick kiss in thanks. If he were there in person, he might even get to see what all the fuss about this match was about, if only by how flushed and animated Claire became during its climax. He liked listening to her explain these little details, just as much as she liked to listen to him recite new bits of research he brought home with him. She particularly liked interrupting long stretches of his explanations to do something distracting, like stroke his neck or get undressed for bed.

Hope smiled to himself as he imagined the latter. He put his pen down and nudged the half-empty, awful coffee away from him, just to have something to do with his hands.

But the bitter fact still remained that he wasn't there with her. He was here, in the office, doing busy work. _Because they trust me to get it done_, he reminded himself, but the explanation didn't quite take the way it ought to have done. Hope knew he should be grateful that he could be useful, that he found a way to adapt so easily in the new world. It hadn't been a completely smooth transition for anyone he knew: Snow had taken months to seclude himself before he was ready to get back into something like a normal life, to get back to the comfort and happiness that he and Serah had waited far too long to share. Sazh had taken his son and retreated to a quiet little town just outside of the city Hope and Claire lived in, joking that he was now a happily retired bachelor. "But you kids can stop by any time you feel like," he always offered. "We're still family, even here." Fang and Vanille had their endlessly entertaining adventures that took them around the world, which often involved near scrapes with death and encountering indigenous, unfriendly animals described as both "sweethearts" and "edible." As for Noel and Yeul... they were just happy to be alive. Hope only heard from them sometimes, usually in letters Yeul sent at the start of every year. In light of the experiences of his friends, Hope knew he could deal with having to sit through dull work. It was a rather low price to pay for his newfound happiness.

"Don't beat yourself up over things you can't control," Claire continued. "We've both done enough of that don't you think?"

Hope ran his pen through several sentences hard enough to tear the paper and create an angry black tatter in the middle of the pile. "If you say so," he mumbled.

"I do," Claire said, using that authoritative tone again. Hope would never tire of hearing it, and it was quite nice to have her say it with that particular combination of words. "Hey. Change of topic here, but how about I bring something in for you to eat?"

"It's nice of you to offer, but I was going to pick something up on the way home."

"That's a terrible idea," Claire said at once. Hope could hear the keys chiming as she picked them up on her end. "I'll bring something in, that way you can eat sooner and not be so grumpy."

Hope frowned. "I'm grumpy?"

He heard the front door open and snap shut fast. Hope listened to Claire set the locks, her voice lowering now that she was in the hallway. "I can _hear_ your frown, Hope. It's as clear as day. Not to mention the eyebrows."

"My eyebrows make sounds now?" he asked, confused.

"I can picture them pretty clearly right now. They're creased over," Claire chuckled.

Hope raised his free hand to feel the crease, and joined his wife in laughing. "All right. You win."

"Knew I would," she said. "What do you feel like having?"

"Surprise me. You'll be a sight for sore eyes no matter what you bring."

"Gotta give me _something_ to work with here," she said.

Hope drew circles around more incorrect, puzzling sentences in the next few sheets of paper, and leaned his elbow on the desk. "Something light and filling, and easy to eat off of your bare chest."

"I'm not a goddamn buffet, Hope," Claire said. Hope could hear her smile, could imagine the little way she chewed on the corner of her lip to suppress it. For the sake of her pride, he kept his laughter to himself.

"No, but you're a dish all the same."

"Oh god, did you get that from Snow?" she groaned. Hope could hear her heel stomp down, echoing in the stairwell to their apartment. "Don't ever say that again, okay? I'll pay you not to say that again."

"Just trying to cheer you up after that disappointing match," Hope said, and he resisted the temptation to add on _"sweetie,"_ though it would be worth it for the consequence. Claire always found inventive ways to get Hope back for such saccharine sweetness in little revenge tactics that involved unusual forms of torment. Hope's personal favorite was when she delayed installing the AC units one summer, and spent most of the days lounging around the flat in boy shorts, knee socks, and nothing else. She timed this for the week he had gone out of town for work, and would voice chat with him wearing that as her outfit of choice. When he'd come home at the end of the week, gleefully expectant and trying not to show it, it was to the crisp air of two brand new AC units, and the sight of his wife in sweatpants and a spaghetti-strap top. She had only polite smiles to give in response to any question about the socks and shorts, and soon Hope stopped asking.

"I guess it's the thought that counts," Claire said. "I'll be there in a bit, okay?"

"I'll let them know, so you don't get held up at the gate."

Hope counted the minutes until Claire arrived, barely about to focus on the work in front of him, or the new data that was piling in through inter-office memos and emails, or what both would do to the work that would be expected of him in the coming day. _That_ would be a problem he'd think about some other time, using his sister-in-law's tried and true advice of facing unpleasant things later, at a comfortable distance. Perhaps it would look less insurmountable after Claire's visit. She had a funny way of making anything seem manageable.

The rest of the workers on the floor had left hours ago, so Hope was alone in his particular wing when Claire finally showed up. This would turn out to be better that he had originally thought, considering what happened next.

Claire walked into Hope's office without hesitation, sliding through the open door with a surprising display of grace. She had a little plastic bag full of sushi hanging off one wrist, a party-sized bottle of iced tea tucked under her other arm, and two paper cups in her right hand. Hope watched as she struggled to shut the door behind her, using only her hips for leverage, which of course drew his eyes to that particular part of her body. She was wearing a skirt and a zip-up sweatshirt, the hood thrown up over her rose-blonde hair and casting her face in half shadow.

"Sorry to make you come all this way," Hope said, smiling as he caught his wife's stare and stepped around the side of the desk to join her. "I know it's pretty late."

"There you go with the apologies again," Claire sighed, throwing back the hood and shaking her hair out of the lazy knot she'd tied it into. "I told you I don't mind, remember?" She handed over the supplies easily enough and gave him a gentle nudge back towards the chair behind his desk.

"You're gonna join me?" he asked.

Claire nodded. "Figured I may as well eat with you. That way we didn't have to postpone dinner."

Just as Hope settled back into his chair, wondering where Claire would sit, she supplied him an answer by resting on his lap. Throwing her legs over one side of the chair's armrest, Claire ignored Hope's pointed looks and polite attempts to clear his throat. She reached out to untie the knot in the plastic bag and began to pull out the little trays of sushi for them to pick at.

"I only got you the basic stuff," she said, "since you specified _light_ as well as _filling_. Not that those two always go together."

"Claire..." Hope began, keeping his tone measured and his attention pointed away from the sudden awareness of how short her skirt actually was. He thought he'd get used to those things by now, but they had a way of creeping up on him by surprise, just when Hope thought he'd built up a decent enough tolerance. It didn't help that he was now even more aware of the heat of her body sprawling halfway over his, at the way she was purposely shifting her weight back and forth to put just enough pressure on his lap to be terribly distracting and pleasantly frustrating.

Claire pretended not to hear him. "So what are you so busy with? Anything good?" She spun the papers Hope had been quite literally tearing through and leaned forward to peer at the scribbles and corrections, giving Hope time to breathe - but just for a second. The air left him again when he realized that at this angle, he could see quite an inviting bit of cleavage.

_She's doing this on purpose_. Not that Hope minded, but he certainly wasn't enjoying it as much as he ought to be. _Remember the boy shorts_, he cautioned himself.

_On second thought, don't remember them_, he corrected silently as he felt a distinct heady rush at the memory. Claire chose that exact moment to writhe on his lap for no reason whatsoever than to make him close his eyes in exasperated happiness. _Don't remember them. Please don't remember them._

"Am I bothering you?" Claire asked, all innocence and charm, but when Hope opened his eyes it was to see a much adored playful smirk on her lips, and a fire in her eyes. Such features usually proceeded some of Hope's fondest memories.

"No," he forced out, and accepted her pitying glance with as much grace as his pride would allow.

"You look bothered," she said.

"I was like this before you got here," Hope pointed out. "Remember? You heard me frowning. It's part of the reason why you said you'd come here. That and the uh... The food." Hope knew he was dangerously close to rambling, but it was the safest option he had at this point. As long as his mind didn't rest too long on boyshorts and all other favored forms of his wife's underwear, he should be fine -

_There it goes again. Dammit._

Claire reached up to nudge her fingers against his forehead in an old familiar taunt. "I've got an idea, Hope," she said, repositioning herself so that she was turned more towards him. She looped her hands behind his neck and stroked the sensitive skin there as gently as she could with her fingertips. "You wanna hear it?"

"Does this idea involve eating?" he asked, focusing every ounce of his attention on the way her touch sent ripples of heat down past his heart and stomach, settling warm and low on the lap she was resting on as comfortably as if she owned the seat. Claire knew Hope's neck was particularly sensitive, just as she knew the after effects a simple touch or kiss or, god help him, quick nipping bite could have on her husband. She surely had to have some idea of what this was doing to him now.

Once she was sure that Hope's question wasn't yet another bit of awfulness worthy of Snow, Claire's lips twitched as she let out a little laugh. Now it was _his_ turn to groan. "No, they'll be plenty of time for that after. As long as we're quick about it."

Of course Hope knew what she meant. He didn't bother wasting time to play dumb, or to get her to say it directly. "Who said anything about being quick?" he asked, moaning quietly at the way her nails moved over the back of his neck.

"You wanna take your time instead?" she asked.

"It would be a nice way to unwind," he began.

"We have probably ten minutes. Fifteen tops," Claire argued, removing herself from his lap and carefully clearing a path on the desk to give them just enough room without causing too much unnecessary damage. "You don't want raw fish to sit out at room temperature for very long."

"Good thing you were so convincing," Hope said, positioning his hands on either side of Claire's hips and using his fingers to nudge the skirt up over her thighs. Of course she had no underwear on. Of course he'd spent the past five minutes imagining her pants for nothing.

_Almost nothing_, he corrected himself quietly. It hadn't been an entirely useless effort.

Claire unzipped and then shrugged out of her hoodie and let it drop to the floor at Hope's feet. As she crossed her arms to pull off her shirt, Hope lifted his hands to her back, sliding his fingers over the skin until he found the clasp of her bra and undid it with practiced quickness. It joined her shirt and hoodie on the floor.

"Good thing you were so easy to convince," she teased, leaning back on the desk and letting Hope take a long, lingering look at her. There was far too much to enjoy about her in that moment. He hardly knew where to look first. Her pointed smirk and quirked eyebrows. Her bare chest and the distracting little array of freckles beneath her breasts, beauty marks he would often trace with his fingers or his lips. Such kisses would alternate in intensity and frequency based on the sounds she made to accompany each caress. Pity they didn't have time for that now.

"Didn't put up much of a fight, did I?" he mused. Hope held his hand against her hip and used the other to undo his trousers and free himself from his pants.

Claire watched him coax himself to an erection, a smirk in place and her eyes flashing, before she straightened up and looped her arms around his neck, pulling herself in closer for a fast, hard kiss. They knocked teeth and laughed and muttered something like an apology, but such words became whispers and faded into silence as she guided him inside. Hope's hands found her hips and held on as tightly as he could without letting the nails come into play. Claire looped her legs around his waist, crossing them at the ankles. He could feel the heels of her boots pressing against the small of his back every time she tensed. It was an oddly pleasant sensation that only caused him to hold on tighter, to thrust harder and faster, and soon they had developed a curious rhythm of silent intensity broken only by gasps, hushed moans, and the usual wordless awe born from the warmth and heat and rush of their bodies.

They weren't always quiet like this. Sometimes they talked quite pleasantly to each other about nothing particularly interesting at all. Other times they said things so foul it would make them blush to recall it later, over cups of coffee and malicious side-eye stares that would leave one spluttering, and the other smirking all the wider. They didn't have much use for words just now, not because of the time limit but because of the whole impromptu arrangement of it all. They were fucking, hard and fast and efficient and satisfying - that didn't leave much room left to focus on banter.

As was customary, Claire finished first, her climax coming in a low, quick hiss of air through her teeth and a tremble that ran down her belly. Hope felt her shuddering all around him, and he focused hard on the sight of her, using her own orgasm to rush him faster towards his own. Her head tilted back, pale lips parted in a gasp, beads of sweat dotting her forehead and dampening her hair that had now become so appealingly tousled, sliding down over one shoulder... All these things, combined together with every inch he had inside her, contributed to the almost agonizingly exquisite build of pressure and heat of which he would never, ever tire. Until finally, loudly, in a spasm that left him weak-kneed and satisfied, he came with a breathless cry that could surely be heard from down the hall, if there were anyone else around to hear him.

Hope had never been happier to work late in his life.

Returning to the snail's pace of work after getting the chance to fuck his wife on his office desk wasn't exactly the easiest transition to make, but Hope managed to do so with a fair bit of grace and effort. He had Claire to thank for that. She always found a way to make things seem manageable.

As she left, blowing a quick kiss from the doorway, she seemed to let in a cool, satisfying breath of air he would have never managed without her. Hope would have to find a way to thank her for it later, when he got home.

* * *

**Notes: **Thank you for reading! This will be a sort of compilation of stories, mostly unconnected but with the overarching theme of Hope and Lightning's new-world/post-series relationship. It won't be told in a strict linear order, and each chapter will follow a set theme as per one of the many 100 Theme Challenges that are available to find online.


	2. Chapter 2

**#24 - No Time**

There was an uncomfortable stretch of time after they got married, but before they could afford a proper place to live for themselves, where Claire and Hope had to move in with her sister to help make ends meet. Hope had only recently been hired by the researching lab earlier that spring, and his meager pay seemed to evaporate more than it accumulated. Most of his paycheck went to loan payments and bills that arrived in increasingly thick, disapproving envelopes full of bold text and FINAL NOTICES printed across their every corner. Claire, much to her chagrin, could hardly find any job at all and should one be generous enough to appear, it was usually one she left within a few weeks' time.

"They won't miss me - they'd have to _need_ me to miss me." Such was her usual refrain whenever the inevitable occurred. This latest statement was said after Hope arrived home late one night to find Claire still in her uniform from the flower shop, sitting curled up on the couch in the dark, drying her eyes discreetly on the edge of the apron.

Hope pretended not to notice the tears, though every bead of them cut like a dagger designed to trace his very bones. Hope knew when Claire was closing herself off for her own protection, and when she did it to protect someone else. It was a subtle distinction, a minor difference in the way she spoke and would act during a conversation. With her eyes tilted down and her tone clipped and carefully controlled, Hope knew she was trying to protect him this time.

He tried not to worry about this. He knew she'd come to him and admit what happened in her own time, at her own pace. All Hope could do was wait, offering his attention and support when it happened.

"I caught someone stealing," Claire finally said, on the cab drive over to her sister's apartment. She was staring out the window as she said it, keeping her eyes trained to the sidewalk that passed outside the glass. A good three weeks had gone by since her floral job and the brief conversation they'd had about it. That she would bring it up on her own, unbidden by any prodding on Hope's part, showed him how much it weighed on her mind.

"How the hell does someone steal flowers?" Hope wondered.

"I'll tell you how - by pretending they bought them half-dead, showing up a day later to complain about the quality, and pulling things out of the case at random to supplement the loss without my permission." Claire's voice had risen loud enough to draw the attention of the driver, but he hastily put his eyes back to the road when Hope saw him looking.

"I'm sorry," Hope had said, because he didn't know what else to say, and because he was truly sorry to hear his wife's anger.

"Don't be sorry - you're not the one who did it. And you're not the manager who sided with the customer over your own worker. I _know_ she was lying, Hope. I _caught her_ in the lie. And what do I get for trying to save us some money? Fucking fired!"

The driver looked back once more and discreetly turned up the radio just a bit louder.

"That's not fair," Hope said to her, after nodding his thanks to the driver.

Claire kept her voice lower after that, a hasty whisper of rage and loathing Hope would soon discover was aimed mostly at herself. "You're damn right it's not fair! And now I have to go leech off Serah for god knows how long - my own little sister, the one I've always taken care of. Now she has to take care of me. It's bad enough I'm deadweight with you."

"Who said you were deadweight?" Hope asked, one arm slung around her shoulder and the other reaching out to hold the hands she was twisting and knotting into fists on her lap. "I never thought of you that way. Not once."

"You don't have to, because I think that about me. All the time."

The confession was worse than hearing her cry. "It'll get better, Claire. Things will get easier." It wasn't a lie, Hope told himself, not if it was said with the intention to make someone you loved feel better. "We just have to keep trying. That's all we can do - keep getting up day by day and walk forward. For better or worse, remember?"

"For richer or poorer," she'd muttered back, smiling at their joined hands. But it wasn't a smile that lasted long.

The only one happy the day that Claire and Hope arrived at Serah's to live with some degree of permanency was Snow, who had always wanted a family, and a close one at that. When Hope and Claire pulled up in front of the apartment, he'd rushed out to begin grabbing at any bag and box he could reach before the cab had come to a full stop. Serah wasn't exactly _disappointed_ with the newly acquired roommates - one in which she'd had her entire life, and was only just now starting to build a life without - but Hope could see the strain the addition put on her. Claire noticed as well and hated herself for it, an agony Hope didn't know how to fix besides giving her comforting, quick kisses on the neck or forehead, and promises to set aside more money with every coming paycheck.

"I could always work overtime," Hope offered the first night they spent under Serah and Snow's roof. There was a little floor fan in front of Snow and Serah's room, but even with its indistinct little hum blaring through the walls, Claire would tense and blush with every lapse of silence as if she could hear something in the not-as-far-away-as-it-could-be distance. Hope knew what she was hearing, and what she was trying _not_ to hear, and so he made a point to talk often and about nothing at all to keep her from blushing to the roots of her hair.

"You're already working hard enough as it is," she said, pummeling and knocking her shoulder into the pillow as she beat it into a more comfortable shape. "If you give them any more of your time, you'll be living there."

Hope watched as Claire switched off the lamp on her side of the bed, throwing her body half in shadow. Her hair glowed paler in the light from his laptop screen, which he adjusted to a less eye-damaging glare when she turned over from one side to the other, facing him. He smiled at the way she wedged herself closer to his side, curling her legs around his own, nudging one of her knees between his, and sliding an arm beneath his shirt to trace her fingers across his stomach. Her touch grew heavier with every little flinch he gave, becoming a slow, lazy back and forth stroke that tickled and soothed in turns.

"I could always set up a pillow and blanket under the desk," Hope said, because staring at the laptop could only be distracting for so long, and because however ticklish he might have been, he couldn't deny how much he enjoyed any attention Claire gave to his body. She wasn't known for her physical affection, which wasn't much of a bother to Hope. He only worried that he was intruding when she'd rather go untouched, even now, years into their relationship. "There's enough space for you to join me, as long as you don't mind the tight fit."

"I'm not going to live under your desk, Hope," she muttered, closing her eyes and continuing to innocently stroke her hand against his stomach. "You'd probably forget I was there and kick me in the face." Her voice had dropped in pitch, heavy with exhaustion and the growing need for sleep.

Hope tapped lazily on the keys, finishing up the last of an exhausting chain of emails that could have waited until the morning, but would have haunted him for most of the night, chasing away his own attempts to sleep. "If you lived under my desk I wouldn't forget you where there for a second," he said, closing out of all the tabs before shutting the laptop down.

"Promise?"

"Cross my heart. I'd be down there with you half the time, anyway."

Hope heard her laugh, a little breathy chuckle, and by the time he'd stowed the laptop in a relatively safe place - the floor, far from where he'd plant his feet in the morning - and turned to give her a kiss goodnight, she was smiling lazily. It was the first time she looked happy all day, and Hope cherished the sight. He adjusted himself to fit around where Claire had settled and was slipping steadily into her own leaden sleep. It would take all the forces of heaven and earth to wake Claire up again, whereas Hope could be jarred from a dream by a speck of dust dropping on the edge of the mattress.

To say that Hope was kept awake by the noises from the next room over, diluted as best they could be through plaster and the additional efforts of the little fan, would be an understatement. By the time morning arrived, Hope had managed only an hour's worth of sleep and it showed on his voice and his face when Claire coaxed him to open his eyes through a combination of efforts. Most of them involved gentle whispers and lights pinches until at last, Hope could feel her crawling on top of him, straddling him as she placed her knees on either side of his hips. She settled down gently, supporting herself through her legs and the arms she used to brace herself on the bed, leaning down to kiss his eyelids and his cheeks. His arms shifted on instinct to curl around her back, fingers pushing under the shirt she wore and cupping the back of her shoulders to pull her down for another kiss, a proper one this time, though he hadn't opened his eyes yet and could still feel sleep clouding a good portion of his judgment.

"This probably isn't a good idea," Claire muttered into his neck, which Hope considered the closest thing to torture. If she knew his stomach was ticklish, then she _understood_ the effects a simple caress or a breath would have on his neck. He didn't understand the sensitivity, nor did Claire question it - she catered to it more often than not, despite her own low interest in the physical. That she was dismissing the very idea she seemed to be offering at the same time was simply cruel.

"Probably not," Hope agreed, but it was far from a convincing statement, since it was delivered after a moan that Claire both caused and hushed with her lips.

"Serah'll come knocking again if we don't show up for breakfast."

"Don't feel like having breakfast," Hope said, moving his hands down to her ass, saying a quiet prayer of thanks to boyshorts, and squeezing tight.

Claire responded by setting the edge of her teeth against the part of his neck where his pulse beat fast. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough for him to feel the bite. "There's no time," she said.

"There's plenty of time," he argued.

It took a tremendous amount of willpower to say the next batch of words while she ground along the length of his cock, boxers and boyshorts and all the mixed fibers in between being the only separation of their skin. "No, there really, really isn't," Claire said, but Hope took heart at the breathlessness of her tone.

"C'mon, Claire," he urged, rubbing one hand against the small of her back while the other reached down in front to glide his thumb along the source of the heat pressed between them. She gasped once, a welcoming sound that only encouraged Hope to stroke and rub closer, slipping his fingers under the band of her underwear to the damp skin beneath.

"_You_ come on!" Claire hissed between her teeth.

They shared in hushed laughter they both helped to mute by a kiss. "That's the idea," Hope said.

A light slap on the shoulder greeted this remark. "No. No it is not. Don't think about it - don't even joke about it. Don't joke about _thinking_ about it." She admonished him all the while she had began to tug at her panties, yanking them down and shifting her legs to discard them with a flourish. Hope waited until she resumed her position on top of him before he ran two fingers across her warm clit and further down, his fingertips sliding into her, slick and wet and full of heat.

"All right, Claire, I heard you," Hope said, watching the way her face began to flush and her eyes fluttered shut.

"Make sure no one else does," she said, pressing her lips into a tight line to block out the moan that his fingers were drawing from her. Two had slipped inside with ease and were beginning their steady long strokes, teasing and pleasing and preparing her for as long as Hope could stand to deny himself the thrill of fucking her properly.

"Doesn't that depend on you?" he asked, just as Claire's hands gripped the sheets in trembling fists and she jutted forward, moving herself in time with Hope's fingers, helping him push them in further and fuck herself along their thin, curled tips. This continued for a time, Claire moving harder and faster, moaning louder and lower, burying her mouth into his shoulder during the highest of the squeals, until all of a sudden she caught his wrist and all but pulled his fingers out of her, pinning his hand to the bed.

"No, no, I want to come with you," she said, breathless and dazed and with her eyes full of lust that Hope would not question. He waited until she caught her breath before he spoke again.

"That sounds like a challenge."

Claire took one look at his obvious arousal and let out a little snorting laugh. "Might be. You interested?"

Hope lifted his hips as she pulled off his boxers and helped her reposition herself over him again. The same as before, free of any obstructions this time. "Give me a target time and we'll see," he said, fitting the head of his cock into her.

That Claire could maintain her poise even as she lowered herself further down enticed Hope more than he thought it would. He clenched his teeth, watching her turn her wrist up to stare at the watchface that had shifted around from its usual place. "I'll give you eight minutes," Claire said, setting the pace as she tightened around every inch he gave. She chewed on the corner of her lips and sighed once, a desperate little huff Hope adored beyond words. "And that's me being fair."

"You're the boss," he gasped, squeezing her hips and thrusting up harder into her. "To honor and obey."

Hope pulled her closer by the same arm bearing the watch, a little delicate silver chain he'd bought as a Christmas gift one year. It had taken her all of three hours to notice the engraving on the back: _Time guided me to your side, and there I shall stand forever more._ She'd been in tears when she found him, and had nearly tackled him to the ground with the force of her embrace and her salty, grateful kisses.

As they clocked in at a hasty, graceless seven and a half minutes, just in time for Serah to come around again, muttering about Snow finishing off the waffles, Hope found himself thinking about the other phrase he'd thought of putting on the watch. He'd have to choose it for another piece of jewelry, perhaps for her birthday this time:_There is no time as dear to me as the time I share with you._


	3. Chapter 3

_Pure eyes, blue like a glassy bead - You are always looking at me, and I am always looking at you._ - Silent Hill 3.

* * *

**#37 - Eyes**

Hope's lips traced a familiar path down the little notches and freckles on Claire's back before his hands moved from the bed to the little bend of her waist. He pulled as gently as he could, lifting her from off her stomach onto her side, before she got the hint and turned fully, lying on her back.

"Wanna try the front for a while?" she teased, watching as his eyes moved from the silver hoop at her navel to the little swell of her belly, as if trying to find which place to kiss first. Claire didn't expect him to answer - not in words, anyway. She knew her husband well enough by now to understand that when his eyes looked that way, hooded with lust and darker than their pale green hue normally became, he was lapsing into a rapt, hungry silence.

And she enjoyed it. More than she thought she would. More than she knew how to explain.

Claire watched as Hope moved his fingers lightly down her sides, making her shiver and hiss low under her breath. She watched, her eyes fluttering shut for a brief moment, as he turned his head to kiss one hip and then the other, dragging his lips across the low bend of her waist and breathing out in a little huff of air that made her skin tingle. His own eyes were shut and it was this, more than his lips and more than his breath, more than his fingers and the way they were now sliding under her thighs, using just the hint of nails to get her back to arch, that made Claire grab a part of his hair in her fist and pull. Not hard enough to hurt him, but hard enough to get him to look at her - and that's all she wanted. She wanted to see his eyes.

"Stop that."

"Stop what?" he asked, peering up into her eyes.

Claire pushed herself onto her elbows and unwound her grip from Hope's hair._ No sense hurting him. Not when I'm asking him to do me a favor._ "Stop teasing me," she said, watching his face carefully to see any telltale sign of a smirk suppressed or any amusement whatsoever.

Hope gave her stomach a quick kiss. "I'm not trying to tease you."

"Well, you are."

"I'm trying to please you, actually."

"Well... you're doing that, too." Claire chewed on the inside of her cheek to stop herself from smiling. How many years had they been together? How many times had they slept together - countless, and yet somehow, terrifyingly so, it was never enough. Not for her.

It scared Claire to think of how badly she wanted him sometimes. She'd never known a hunger like it before - certainly not in her old life. There hadn't been any time for it, and she was more than happy to set aside any urges or frustration for the sake of something more practical. Other times, Claire wondered if her desire for Hope, as feverish and rabid as it could be even now, six years into their marriage, was just a way to make up for lost time, lost years, so many moments wasted in loneliness and isolation.

Claire couldn't know exactly how Hope felt - he'd confide in her as much as he could put every feeling into words, and she would always know how to read his little signs and hints, gifts of gestures and expressions that he had no way of knowing revealed so much while he remained absolutely silent. But she would remind herself always, endlessly, that another person would always be a stranger no matter how much of themselves were laid bare before you. Some secrets could never be learned because they could never be shared, no matter how much love was built between them. It was a simple, bitter fact of life, and of love. Claire didn't think she could live her entire life with Hope being afraid of this truth.

And yet it was only when Hope's eyes clouded with his own hunger did Claire feel she could see down through to the part of him words could never share. Something true and dark, beautiful and untamed - something she wanted to take inside her hands and heart and self and keep warm, safe, and loved. His desire, his fire, everything that burned and ached and satisfied - Claire wanted it. She wanted to see it.

Claire reached out to cup her husband's face in her hands and pull herself closer, bending forward to kiss him hard. He responded with equal ardor, though Claire could sense the hesitation behind each returning kiss. And sure enough, when they'd broken off for the necessary gasp of air -

"Claire? What is it?"

She kept her eyes closed, but only for the time it took to take a long, fortifying breath. When she opened them again, Hope's eyes were full of nothing but kindness, the lust dulling to a spark.  
It was time to set it alight.

"It's your turn to be on your back," she said, putting her hands on his shoulders and bringing her legs up, on either side of his waist to lock him between her thighs. She twisted her hips and rolled him into the necessary position, keeping her hands on his shoulders for a second as she steadied herself on top of him.

Hope made the transition with no complaints. "Anything else?" he asked, his hands cupping her ass and squeezing it tight, before he moved his hands up the small of her back to massage the skin there. A small, gentle gesture that always made her flush from the depth of her belly up to her cheeks.

Claire thought quickly, fleetingly, of the morning after they'd moved in with Serah and Snow. How awkward that time of their lives had been, how strained those days of their marriage. How far behind them was it now - four years. Four impressive years. Here we are together, still.

"I want you to keep your eyes on me," Claire said, keeping her husband's gaze inside her own as she shifted herself on top of him, purposely grinding down against him in an effort to both please and tease. No one said she couldn't do it to _him_.

"Not hard to do," he said, his voice strained and his eyes sliding slowly lower with every move Claire's hips made, before he remembered what she just asked him to do. His eyes flew open again. "Actually, never mind. It is pretty hard to do."

"Can't be _that_ bad," she muttered, watching the way Hope's jaw clenched as his mouth tightened. She leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek, then put her teeth into the gesture, causing him to wince.

"No, it's just that _good_."

Claire lifted herself up to guide him inside her. "Sure it is."

Hope muttered a wordless, breathless sigh. "It is. You are."

Claire kissed his other cheek. "Your eyes are closing again."

"Are they?" Hope looked up at her. "I didn't realize."

"Eyes forward, Hope. Remember?"

"I remember." Hope's hands moved to her hips, taking hold of her to steady himself as he met her every thrust and the frantic set of her pace. "Of course I remember."

Claire smiled at the way his throat tightened, his adam's apple shifting as his breath came harder, faster, just like the pair of them working together. "I like the way you look at me when we fuck," she said, drawing courage from the fire inside her that grew into a charring, aching blaze whenever they were together like this, skin and sins and hearts bared to be loved, to be cherished, to be shared. "I like it when you look at my lips and my chest. I like it when you lift your head so you can look down to see yourself inside me." Claire tensed herself with her legs to support her weight and reached forward, cupping her hands around the back of Hope's head. "Want to see it now? Do you?"

Gasping, his breath ragged, Hope was already looking, already moaning. "Yes," he was saying, the word like a prayer, a plea, and a confession all in one. "Yes, Claire. Yes, please. Yes."

Claire had to move her hands back to the bed to keep up with the pace, gripping the blankets and sheets next to Hope's sweat-damp hair tight as she fucked him harder, drawing him in deeper. His eyes moved from where they were joined to the dangling star charm on her navel, to the way her breasts swayed with every thrust.

"Look at me, Hope," Claire moaned, knowing she was close, knowing Hope would get her to that edge and over it, over and over again, until the only choice they had left was to collapse, exhausted, spent. "I like the way you look when you come."

She'd never told him that before. She'd never told it to herself, either - never really allowed herself to think that something as jarring as Hope looking so purely helpless with passion could be a pleasing, lovable thing. But Claire indeed loved every moment of his climax. The way his eyes would flutter, fighting to stay open, the lids like little wings batting against a cage. The way his mouth would open, slack and small, letting out a long, low sigh that seemed to rise out of the depths of his bones. Satisfaction, that sigh said. Pleasure, release, relief.

And Claire could give it to him, just as much as he gave it to her.

And Claire could help him find it, just as much he helped her.

Hope cried out her name as he came, and when she followed after, only a few seconds behind, Claire stayed silent, hushed, rapt with awe, and smiling. There was only love in his eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

**#14 - Smile**

Now that they were together and had the time for it, there were a lot of things Hope was starting to learn from Claire's smiles. Her moods, yes, that was obvious - her thoughts as well, to be sure. But there was a world of other discoveries to be made to the keen observer with an interest in learning.

A sideways, crooked smile - more like a smirk - meant she was either trying not to laugh or she thought what she heard was absolutely ridiculous, and was fighting not to mock it. It was a hard distinction to make, much to Hope's chagrin, considering all the time he'd been spending with her lately. But Hope was learning not to dwell on his failures - it helped that Claire didn't let him. So he usually required the assistance of taking a quick look at her pale, clever eyes whenever this smile gave him trouble. A narrowed gaze meant she was fighting a laugh, whereas when her eyes were a little wider than usual, receptive, calm, still like deep waters, Hope knew she was letting loose a torrent of silent insults inside her head.

There was usually only one way to handle both situations: talk to her. That was it, no big secret there. Hope wondered how he could have ever, once upon a time, centuries upon centuries ago, saw her as a cold, distant woman. She wasn't, not at all. Once Claire felt like she had a receptive enough audience and wore her sweetest smile - the one that said, "_T__alk to me, I wanna hear from you"_ - she could almost talk her throat hoarse.

Or maybe that was just with him. Hope couldn't always tell. But he knew that talking helped, so he had to try.

"Are the roses doing well?" he asked. They were eating dinner at a table that felt no larger than a napkin, once all the plates and dishes were applied to it. The only benefit was how close they could sit to each other - and how easier this made aims for less-than-sober food fights. She usually won those. "I saw them on my way in earlier, and they looked like they were doing okay."

Claire shrugged as she cut into her steak, her smile turning into a softer one that Hope recognized. "They should be. Yeul helped me pick out the best soil for them. But I'll know for sure by next week." Gardening had steadily grown from a vague interest to a full-on hobby in the months after Hope and Claire met again. It helped that they were both trying to reconcile this new sense of wonder at the road ahead of them and the simple, easier to understand happiness that they could finally make the time to be people of their own choosing.

"Which ones did you plant again?" Hope asked, though he knew for a fact which ones she'd toiled for hours to get into the ground, cursing and muttering to herself, smearing dirt across her forehead with every angry sigh. It wasn't exactly a day he was likely to forget: He'd helped her wash all the muck out of her hair later that day on her request, on some flimsy pretense of testing out the new bathtub together. "The yellow, the red and... That new one Vanille got you, right?"

"Oerba Dust," Claire said with a little nod. "She says it's supposed to be silver and blue, but I kinda have my doubts. Flowers like that don't happen around here."

"You never know," Hope said, pressing the point as gently as he could.

Claire shrugged again and the smile turned sarcastic. He could tell by the way it stretched once to the side in a thin little line. "From what I've seen of the plants around here, colors like that are pretty rare - it'd be a miracle if they even start to bloom."

"Then we'll just have to keep an eye on them. See if there's anything we can do to make sure all your hard work pays off."

Claire considered this, and Hope's expression, in silence. "I'm not sure," she said quietly, thoughtfully, talking half to herself. But Hope knew he wasn't barred from entering the discussion. It helped that he was the only one in the room with her at the time: that certainly narrowed down the number of people she could also be talking to. "Don't you get the impression that this place - this whole world we're in now, I mean - isn't designed for miracles?"

Hope thought about this for a while, and had finished off half his plate before he had a proper response. She was expecting him to be serious - he could tell by her smile, a little crescent moon curve that was in parts too gentle and too sad. It was the sort of smile she had when Serah and Snow said goodbye, moving closer to the city and therefore closer to the jobs both of them had somehow landed. It was the sort of smile that asked the person not to look too closely, or else the cracks and seams would shine through. _Be as serious as you like,_ this smile said,_ just don't dig too deep into what you see from me_.

So Hope would go for the opposite of her expectations. He'd go for the very opposite of serious, though he was starting to feel a muscle in his cheek twitch at the thought of being so uncommonly sweet. But that didn't matter - it couldn't be the only thing that did. Not when his soon-to-be wife's smiles were on the line.

"Terrible things happened on Cocoon, too," Hope reminded her, setting down his knife and fork and reaching for the napkin. "And on Pulse... Fang should really write down her stories and try to get them published. You know, a memoir masquerading as fiction."

"She is. Vanille's gonna hold her to it this time. Once they get back from their trip they're going to go see how Aoede's doing and get her to help."

Hope thought about this. "Sounds like their minds are set."

"Seems like it."

"But, Claire... Don't you think that alone, what you just said, is kind of like a miracle itself?"

Claire stared at him, her fork half-way to her lips. She lowered it. "What do you mean?"

_She'll never let me live this down_, Hope realized, but he also realized he didn't quite care. If he got her to laugh at how absurdly cheesy his next statement was, then it would be a victory all the same.

"Well, look at us. Not just _us -_ I mean all of us. Everyone had to work so hard just to find a place to belong here once we came over... Not to mention trying to track each other down..." He paused, letting that sink in. When he saw her smile start to fade, Hope reached out to hold her free hand, grasping it tight. "So when that actually happened, as impossible as it seemed, I came up with a little theory."

Claire looked at the hand that was resting atop of hers, her smile broadening to the point where Hope could feel his own grin emerge in response. It was hard to resist the charms of that look. Not that he'd tried, really. "All right. What's your theory?" she asked, taking another bite of her dinner.

"This world _is_ designed for miracles - but on a smaller scale than the ones we're used to. You have to look at the little things, the easy to miss details that might not mean much to anybody else. Take Serah and Snow for instance, okay? They're together again. Took them a while, sure, but they're together and they're married, and they got everything in the works to finally be as happy as they ought to have been ages ago."

"Right, okay. What about them?" she asked, urging him to the point.

"Well to anybody else, they wouldn't see how incredible that is, would they? They'd just see two people who are in love doing what two people who are in love do, instead of seeing how amazing it is that they can even _still _be in love after all... All that." Hope didn't want to touch too close to all the darker secrets lurking in their extended family's pasts. Claire knew it just as much as he did and nothing could be gained from digging out those angry wounds.

Claire nodded, taking this in, but her eyebrows were knitting over as she gave his words some thought. "Small scale miracles," she said, repeating and paraphrasing Hope. "Hmm. I wonder..."

Hope drew back his hand and began to collect the empty dishes and plates. He recognized that look in her eye, as well as that wicked little grin. It was one of his favorite smiles. "Wonder what?"

"I wonder what you'd consider your little miracle," Claire said, standing up to help him. They fell into little domestic trappings with ease, though there was the usual confusion over who did the laundry on what day, and how in the name of everything that was good and holy did so much dust accumulate on every surface of their home every week.

_Just say it_, Hope said, offering Claire a little chuckle and a somewhat bashful grin as they began to scrape the plates and dishes clean, stacking them up in the sink for one of them to wash. _Just say it and hope it doesn't get back to Noel or even Vanille_. They'd never let him hear the end of it.

"Meeting you, of course." Hope found it easier to talk to her profile, which he kept a curious eye on as they set about washing the plates, dishes, and utensils. He handed her each one to dry, and she would pile them neatly in the white wire rack beneath the window, lined with flower pots she was hoping to fill with all sorts of houseplants if her gardening adventures proved successful. "That day you turned up to see me was the closest thing to a miracle, you know. And every day since then is just more proof added on to that fact."

"Hope."

He turned to look at her. She was smiling gently, the kind of smile he'd see when they woke up together, or when he caught her singing idly along to the radio. Content, peaceful - relieved.

Claire propped herself up on her toes and laid a hand to rest over Hope's heart, which was thundering as loudly as it always did whenever she touched him. Kissing him softly on the cheek, Claire leaned around to his ear and said, "That was the cheesiest thing you've ever said to me."

Hope laughed. "I know. Sorry."

"I liked it, though. Say it again."

Hope returned her loving smile, perhaps his favorite of them all, and did as he was told.

* * *

**Notes: **Thank you, as always, to the people who leave their thoughts and comments about this and other Hoperai fics. I'm very grateful to anyone who gives me their time. I do have one small request, though: Whenever I update this, I seem to get some anonymous person leaving very bizarre requests for Hoperai smut fic as a "review." If this is you: stop doing it. I don't mind taking requests, but I do mind them being posted as "reviews." It's weird and annoying.


	5. Chapter 5

**#43. Dying**

"I'm dying," she said, her voice a wet, choked croak. She flung her arm over her eyes and turned away from the light streaming in from the window, curling up further into a knot of sheets on the bed. "I'm _dying_."

"You aren't," Hope said, knowing he ought not to smile, knowing it was rude of him to even think of it. "Trust me, Claire. You won't die."

"Then what's wrong with me?" she demanded, lifting her hand to glare at him. "Because I'm pretty sure this is the closest to death I've ever been since we got here."

"Here in this house or here in this world?"

"Yes," she said, and groaned once more, a sound of obvious discomfort and pain.

Hope gave his wife's shoulder a soft, feather-light kiss. "That wasn't an answer," he pointed out, resting one hand on her hip as he drew her closer.

"Sure it was," Claire mumbled, turning so that she could rest her head on his chest, flinging one arm around him and holding him close.

"It was nice of them to take us in," Hope said, reaching for something to say. Something practical, something comforting - something to take her mind off whatever it was her body was doing. That was one of the reasons, one of the many reasons, he loved Claire so much. She took solace in the rooted, simple things now, and Hope could actually manage to be useful to her when she needed it. No more floundering in the dark, drifting miserably for a word, any word, that would chase away the sorrow. He had them all right there in his head, ready to say at a moment's notice.

Too bad they weren't able to make her _physically _better.

"I'm not ungrateful," Claire said, giving Hope's chest a little poke. "I just figured we'd have a place of our own by now. It's been six months."

Hope grew quiet. "We can start looking for places next month, if you want," he said, doing the quick math in his head, adding up paychecks and hazarding a guess at their post-tax amount. All those hours he'd worked at the lab were finally starting to pay off, and all that overtime he'd clocked at the expense of any _other _time with Claire was not going to go to waste. Hope wouldn't let it. "I should have enough by then."

"If I'm still alive by then," she muttered, but Hope could hear the joke in her voice. She did this now, more than she'd ever done when they were in the old world, in their old lives: tease and mock, but without a barbed, bitter edge that came from a broken, fearful heart. Claire's sense of humor could be at times petulant and sarcastic, a sort of dark, silly little thing he cherished so dearly it almost left him with a kind of ache. It also came out in full swing now that they were living with her sister, who seemed to draw it out of her with an ease born from both blood and experience. No one could run a snarky peanut gallery quite like the Farron sisters.

Hope kissed the top of her head, catching a whiff of her shampoo. Cherry blossoms or something, he thought, trying to remember it. The bottle was pink and half-full, standing on a shelf in the shower next to the communal body wash (that neither of them touched, knowing it was all Snow's) and an unused sampler size exfoliant that Claire had gotten from her job working at a beauty store. She hadn't lasted too long there: Lady Luck saw fit to bless the place with an electrical fire nearly three weeks into Claire's employment. The compensation she'd received hadn't been much, and Hope found himself and all his simple, practical comforts powerless to help her for the first time in the days after the fire. Claire's heart had taken an awful blow, and she'd fallen under a shadow of doubt not quite seen since they first made the decision to move in with the newly made Villiers'.

_And now this,_ he thought, kissing her again and rawing her close with both arms. _Now she's sick. _"Of course you'll be alive, Claire," he said.

"You know, on Cocoon I wouldn't have had to deal with this," she said, not eactly ignoring him as much as she was shelving his comment for a later point in the conversation. "There were all kinds of medicine I could take the second I felt like I was being knocked on my ass. You'd think we'd have that stuff here."

"We do," Hope reminded her. "They can be found at pharmacies."

"I've looked at some of those _remedies_," Claire said, shaking her head as best she could in her position. "You know that half of their side-effects are as bad as still being sick? You might as well just suffer."

"Which I guess is what you chose to do," he said, ruffling her hair just a little.

Claire batted his hand away. "Of course," she said. "The last thing I need is to make this any worse." She paused, sniffling once. "And there's really nothing that could help, anyway. Because I'm still pretty sure I'm dying."

Hope couldn't help but laugh. She just sounded so _sure._ "Well, there _is_ a bug going around..." he said, reaching out to lower her arm with one hand so that he could hold his other one to her forehead. She still felt hot, and slightly clammy. Hope tilted his head to gaze into her eyes and noticed they were still watery, red around the edges, matching the faint tinge to the edge of her nose. "You probably caught that."

"From who?" she asked, giving him another, piercing glare.

"The culprit could be any one of us," he said, happy to play the game of deathly serious sick-time talk, as long as it kept him in bed with her. "Serah's always talking about how disgusting people at school are - remember her horror stories about living in a dorm? And you know how Snow gets when she's anywhere close to being under the weather."

"They basically stay sick for _days_," Claire said, nodding sagely. "I taught her better than that. You have to go into a kind of quarantine whenever you're sick to keep it away from the rest."

"Did you learn that from your parents?" Hope wondered, pushing her hair over her shoulder as it fell down into her face, preventing him from seeing her clearly.

Claire shook her head. "No. I just picked it up after they were all gone and I couldn't take any risks with our health."

They lapsed into silence, staring into each other's eyes. The morning was starting to dawn bright and crisp, and the sunlight ascended high, showering the bed in light. It was a clear autumn day whose triumphant chill made the house cool despite the bright sunlight, necessitating blankets and close contact, no matter how sick one of the pair might be. These were the sort of days Hope liked the most, and could enjoy the least: he had to leave for work far too early, and would usually come back an hour or so after Serah in the evenings. One of the other three housemates had dinner all sorted by then, and the warmth of the oven and the heat having kicked in drove away the brisk, refreshing chill.

"You're not really dying," Hope said, reaching out to hold her face in his hand.

Claire reached up to hold it there, balancing most of her weight on her free arm now, and positioning herself to rest half on his chest. "I know I'm not," she said. "I just feel so _awful_."

"I know you do. Want me to pick up something for you?"

She thought about this, chewing on the edge of her bottom lip. Hope resisted the urge to kiss her, though it was more than a little tempting, seeing her like that. She probably wouldn't appreciate it much, seeing as she was sick.

At last, Claire said, "Crackers. Crackers and ginger ale."

"I was thinking more along the lines of soup or soup-based comfort foods," Hope said. "But that's it? Really?"

"That's all I feel like I can eat now," Claire said, wincing as another fresh roll of pain unfurled from her stomach, making her shiver. "It's supposed to make you feel better, or at the very least settle upset stomachs." Claire laid her head down on Hope's chest again and waited for the nausea to pass.

Hope held onto her and waited, too.

The minutes passed in silence as they draew closer to each other, sharing warmth.

"Hope?"

"Yes?"

"Shouldn't you be leaving for work soon?"

There was something in her voice. Something about the way she said it that made Hope cringe. A kind of resigned, broken sadness, like she was peeling off a part of her happiness and letting it fade away. It could be the sickness talking, making everything seem ten times as miserable and dramatic, moreso than it needed to be. Or it could just be Hope's eager wish to stay right there in his wife's arms, in their pitifully undersized bed, moving only to shift to more comfortable positions, or perhaps get up to make some tea and fetch whatever other remedies she asked for.

"I could always call in," Hope said, letting the suggestion fade off, leaving it entirely up to her.

"You never take sicks days," she said. Not as a criticism, more a comment. A simple, basic fact. It comforted him.

"I could always start."

"Not if you make a habit of it."

"I won't. I'll make an exception."

"Better come up with a good excuse, then."

"Does that mean you won't help me?"

"I'm dying here, remember?"

Hope laughed. "I thought we agreed that you weren't dying?"

"I spoke too soon," Claire grumbled, flicking the edge of his nose as lightly as she could. It made him laugh again.

"Hand me my phone?" he asked, nodding to where it sat on the nightstand.

"That was quick," Claire said, pushing herself up on her elbow to snatch it. Her shirt pulled up, exposing her hip above the band of the boxer shorts she'd snatched from Hope's drawer when dressing for bed the night before. "Got an excuse already?"

Hope nodded vaguely and dialled the number for work, smiling at Claire when she settled back down at his side. "You inspired me," he said.

She eyed him warily but couldn't resist the temptation to rest again, curling up around Hope in a little ball of warmth. And despite all her discomfort, the aches and chills, the nausea that left her moaning and in agony on the bathroom floor, now at the very least Hope was there to keep her company in self-imposed quarantine.

"What'd you tell him?" she asked when he got off the phone a few minutes later.

"That I was dying," Hope said, bluntly, baldly, and with such a serious face that she couldn't help but laugh.

"Welcome to quarantine," Claire said, giving him a half-hearted salute.

"Happy to be here," he said, playing along. "It's a wonderful day for a plague."


End file.
